Briefs: Powerball jackpot grows

The jackpot for Powerball’s Saturday drawing has climbed to $325 million, the fourth-largest in the game’s history. A single winner choosing a cash payout would get nearly $213 million before paying state and federal taxes. Powerball jackpots have been growing faster since the game’s organizers doubled the ticket price to $2 in January. An Iowa couple won $202 million in a Sept. 26 drawing, and then an anonymous winner in Delaware got $50 million prize the next week. The current jackpot has been building since then.

The jackpot for Powerball’s Saturday drawing has climbed to $325 million, the fourth-largest in the game’s history. A single winner choosing a cash payout would get nearly $213 million before paying state and federal taxes. Powerball jackpots have been growing faster since the game’s organizers doubled the ticket price to $2 in January. An Iowa couple won $202 million in a Sept. 26 drawing, and then an anonymous winner in Delaware got $50 million prize the next week. The current jackpot has been building since then.

Workers march against Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart workers and supporters marched in protest at a number of stores nationwide Thursday and Friday, blasting the wages, benefits and treatment of employees of the world’s largest retailer. The efforts seemed to do little to keep shoppers away, though – Wal-Mart said it was its best Black Friday ever. In Paramount, Calif., authorities arrested a small group of protesters Friday outside a Wal-Mart for blocking the street. In Lakewood, Colo., shoppers hesitated as they passed dozens of protesters outside a Wal-Mart but entered without incident. A union-backed group called OUR Walmart has said that planned to hold an estimated 1,000 protests in 46 states. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has refuted that estimate, saying the figure is grossly exaggerated and that the protests involved few of its own employees.

RIM’s shares jump in value

Shares of Research in Motion Ltd. jumped Friday as investors seemingly grew more optimistic about a February launch of the Canadian company’s much-delayed BlackBerry 10 smartphones. RIM will release the latest version of its smartphone “not too long” after a Jan. 30 launch event, the company’s chief operating officer said earlier this month. The Waterloo, Ontario, company seems to be preparing for a February global launch, a month earlier than many analysts were expecting.

Kodak innovator dies

Bryce Bayer, a retired Kodak scientist and the inventor of a widely used color filter array that bears his name, has died. He was 83. Bayer, of Brunswick, Maine, died Nov. 13, a spokeswoman for Direct Cremation of Maine confirmed Friday. The cause of death wasn’t released. His Bayer filter was patented in 1975 and is incorporated into nearly every digital camera and camera phone, Rochester, N.Y.-based Kodak said in a 2009 press release announcing Bayer’s receipt that year of the Royal Photographic Society’s Progress Award. The filter allows devices to capture color images with a single sensor.